


The Road Less Travelled

by woppetry



Category: Mad Max Series (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Road Trip, And nobody dies i promise, Attempted Kidnapping, Attempted Organ thievery, Gen, In which I attempt to rewrite Fury Road in the context of pre apocalypse world, Mentions of Cancer, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Past Abuse, Past Rape/Non-con, Past Underage, This story starts out pretty grim but will get more lighthearted as the fic goes on I promise, there will be dogs and diners and a baby and Max not understanding your pop culture references
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-27
Updated: 2015-06-08
Packaged: 2018-04-01 11:07:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4017433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/woppetry/pseuds/woppetry
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You meet some strange people on a road trip, but when your road trip is not only a fun trek across the country but also a hectic, fear-filled flee from your abusive crime lord husband with your fellow wives, somehow every weirdo in a 20 mile radius manages to flock to you.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Great Escape

**Author's Note:**

> A few quick warnings: The sexual violence in this fic is about the same level as it is in the movie: It's not at all explicit, but it's referenced very heavily and you definitely know it's there.  
> The violence is about at the same level as the film as well: you see a few hits and maybe some blood splatters, but no horrifying slow motion or excruciating detail or anything like that.  
> Also, this is set in the US I'm afraid, because that's the only way I could make the plot I have planned out work because the price of medical care there plays a key part in this fic.  
> Also because the only road trips I have any knowledge of are American ones, thanks to the pop culture overflow we get here in the UK from the US, and I have no knowledge of road trips myself, because if you try to take a road trip in Scotland you either end up in a slightly damper, muddier field than the one you started in, or Glasgow. And you do not want to navigate Glasgow by car.  
> The Dag and Max are both still Australian though, if that helps? Their backstory's will come later.  
> Finally: I know nothing about cars. I'm sorry. Enjoy!

Splendid had expected that the day they finally escaped from their husband would be more dramatic. She had expected one of either two things: fear, or jubilation. Fear as they slipped out in the middle of the night ready to walk as far as their legs would take them, clutching as many supplies as they could carry; or jubilation as they walked freely away from a dead man who's ghost could do nothing more than haunt their dreams. Instead, she felt nothing but a grim determination. It was amazing what three and a half tonnes of truck could do to alleviate fear. 

It went without saying that she had been planning this escape for months, but it was only recently that she had been offered a chance of escape that had any hope of success. She was still reeling from the revelation. She was escaping. They were all escaping. It was actually happening. She glanced over at Furiosa, their saviour, who drove the truck with a steely expression and a watchful eye on the speedometer. It would not do to get pulled over by the cops at this point. Splendid almost couldn't believe all this was real. 

In the back seat of the truck sat her fellow “wives”. Capable sat nearest the window, her nervous fingers plaiting and unplaiting her red hair into more and more intricate styles. Beside her The Dag chewed at her fingernails contemplatively, staring past Capable and out at the bare unchanging landscape. Toast came next, the pistol handed to her by Furiosa clasped so tightly in her hands that her dark knuckles turned white. Finally came Cheedo, the youngest of all of them. She sat hunched in on herself and gazed unblinkingly out the other window. Her cheek was still dark with the bruises that had finally made them desperate enough to flee.

Cheedo had been brought to them a year ago at the fragile age of fourteen with tears staining her cheeks and a shake to her hands that never quite left. She told them about a car crash and her mother dying, and hands that pulled her from the burning wreckage only to shove her into another car, and a hot, torturous drive that lasted for days while a piece of metal embedded in her leg bled sluggishly. Then white, bright lights and water and new clothes. A voice telling her she was to be the new wife of a man named Joe, and the sensation of the hole in her leg being drawn closed by coarse threads, the pain so great she passed out. And then she woke up here. 

The Dag had turned very pale when they found out her age. “Fourteen.” She'd whispered, “She's fucking fourteen.” 

Capable had jumped into action, approaching the girl with caution and wiping away her tears before pulling her into a tight hug. 

“We won't let him have you.” Toast had growled, turning towards Splendid, who's brain was already ticking over with a plan to protect this girl. She would voice it to the others in secret later, while Cheedo was asleep, but for now what she said was:

“We have to get out of here.” 

 

For a few months it had worked, their plan to protect the child in their midst. When their husband had entered the room, looking for sex, they would exchange wordless glances, and one of them would offer themselves up to him before he had the chance to choose his latest conquest. It made the rape marginally more bearable, knowing that they were doing this to protect a child, yet each time, Splendid felt her anger grow. How dare this man place them in this situation. How dare he force her to choose between this and the rape of a child. She could see the anger rising in the others as well, most notably in Toast, who would spit and punch her pillow as she returned, breaking whatever breakable thing she could find before retreating to the shower. 

And then Splendid got pregnant. And as soon as the bump began to show, Joe wouldn't touch her. She had tried her hardest to keep him focused on her, to keep him from looking to where Capable, The Dag, and Toast were inching slowly in front of Cheedo, but Joe had caught on. In a fury he had pushed past the three girls, grabbing a struggling Cheedo by her wrist and dragging her away. They had tried to stop him, The Dag snatching at his hair, and Toast throwing a punch, while Capable held on to Cheedo, but he was too fast and too strong, and before they knew it, the door was slamming behind him with a click. 

Still, they had persisted in protecting Cheedo from the worst of Joe's rage, and in the following months he only stole her from them twice again. But it was this third time that was the worst. She had returned to them with tears in her eyes and her face a mess of bruises. Apparently the novelty of his new wife had worn off. Surprisingly, it was Capable who was angriest this time. She had lived up to her name and tended to Cheedo's wounds with a mother's care, but awoke early the next morning, stalking the house that was their prison until she reached the garage. There, her careful eyes watched the comings and goings of business associates, household staff, and the young men who seemed to hold undying loyalty to her husband for reasons unknown to her. 

Finally, her eyes honed in on the woman who would become their saviour. The others wouldn't have thought it to look at her. Furiosa's outward appearance screamed _tough._ From her hair shaved down to the scalp, to the axle grease on her face, to the grubby tank top that revealed a metal prosthetic limb, nothing about her gave any hint that she would be sympathetic towards the wives plight. Yet this had always been Capable's strongest asset, recognising the good in people before even they themselves knew it. Sure enough, Furiosa agreed to help them escape. 

It helped that Furiosa herself had been planning her own escape from her place in Joe's “business”. She had managed to make contact with her family for the first time in years- her great aunt, who had assured her in her letter that her house was as good as hers if she could manage the journey from Florida to Washington. Furiosa was determined to get there if it killed her. Factoring the additional women into this plan was not difficult. With the plan already formed, it took only three days to set it into motion. The girls were left relatively unguarded during the day. Joe trusted the undying loyalty of his men and knew that his wives had no way of breaking through the locks on the mansion doors or the bulletproof glass in the windows- and upon their escape, where would they go? He knew they were miles away from anyone who might help them. Furiosa had smirked as she had broken through the locks on the door and smuggled the girls into the back of her truck. He'd been too cocky. 

It was almost suspicious how smoothly it went from there. They'd been on the road for hours without any sign of trouble or pursuit. It was possible that Joe didn't even realise they were gone yet, despite the aggressive messages they had sprayed across his rooms with a can of silver paint Furiosa had wordlessly handed to them. It was too easy. 

It took Furiosa suddenly slowing the truck to a standstill to change the stifling atmosphere in the van. She took out some sheets of metal from under the dashboard and handed them to Splendid, followed by a toolbox. 

“C'mon.” She said, stepping out of the cab. “We'll want to change the number plates. The last thing we want is the Immortan filing a stolen vehicle report.” The girls followed her out and blinked in the bright, Floridian sunlight. Furiosa offered up a spanner and Toast took it without hesitation, setting about unscrewing the old number plates. The Dag took the second one and got to work on the rear plates, while Splendid stood by with the replacements. 

As they settled back into the cabin of the truck, they felt a great weight lift from their shoulders. They were escaping. Furiosa was taking them to the greener state of Washington, where they would have a house to live in that they could leave whenever they wanted to, and the freedom to live their lives how they wanted and when they wanted was at last within their grasp. It finally felt real, and as they settled into a far more cheerful mood of conversation and song, their escape began to feel a lot less like a desperate attempt at freedom, and more like a road trip.


	2. Max Is Having A Bad Day

Two hours in to their road trip the escaping women began to relax. Three hours in, they began to sing. It was Capable who started it, remembering the lyrics to a pop song she had learnt a dance to as a child (a dance she had insisting on teaching The Dag one particularly boring day, despite The Dag's protests.) 

Cheedo found she remembered the song as well and together the two of them sang along to every song they both had a vague knowledge of, until Furiosa grew tired of the acapella singing and switched on the radio. It had spiraled from there, as the wives all realised how easy it was to pick up the lyrics of songs on the radio, which could be found twice an hour if you were good at station hopping. 

Five hours in, as the beat to what was apparently a “Number 1 chart hit”, according to the faux cheer of a show host, faded into oblivion for the third time, the relaxed silence was permeated by the sound of The Dag's stomach growling. The Dag laughed, catching Furiosa's eye in the rear view mirror. “Sorry chief.” She said, patting the slim shape of her stomach, “You wouldn't happen to have any food up there in those compartments would ya?” Furiosa glanced back to the road and the said nothing. The Dag's smile faded slightly. “Wait... You mean you didn't pack any food? Listen, I don't mind going a few days without food if it means getting away from Joe, but Splendid's nine months pregnant. She can't do that.”  
Still, Furiosa didn't look up from the road. “There's a diner coming up in two miles. We'll stop there.” 

They entered the diner with all the timidness of deer exploring a new patch of land. Their eyes flitted around to the other patrons, taking cautious steps along the tiled floor, as if Joe could leap out at any moment and cart them back to his stifling house. Furiosa stood in the doorway and watched this bizarre- and slightly worrying- display. As they approached the counter and a woman in a pink apron smiled at them it was Cheedo, surprisingly enough, who smiled back. 

“What can I get you, sugars?” The woman grinned in a false accent. 

“We're kind of new here.” Capable stammered out. “What would you suggest?” 

“Well, we have all sorts! I can do you a burger and fries, or hash browns or- you seem like breakfast people, am I right in thinking that? We do an all day breakfast here, so I could do you pancakes or French toast or-” 

“Yeuch, not toast.” Toast made a face. Splendid stared at her in horror. 

“You don't like toast? But your _name_ is toast!” 

Capable smiled nervously back at the woman. “We'll have the pancakes.” 

“-I never said I liked toast!”

“It was kind of implied when we all picked what names we wanted to choose and you _explicitly_ said you wanted to be called Toast-”

“I never said my reasoning for that name! Not once. You said “Okay then toast.” And I said, “Splendid, Splendid.”-”

“Six orders of pancakes, coming right up.”

In the doorway of the diner, Furiosa smiled. 

 

In a car, seven miles west of where Furiosa and the wives had paused their escape attempt in favour of food, Max Rockatansky was having a Bad Day.

He had had some pretty bad days in his life, but this was definitely up there as one of his worst. Probably his third worst day, in behind the day his wife and daughter were murdered, and the day he trusted a shady guy with a gyrocopter and a suspicious number of snakes to transport him between two towns in time to catch the murderers (long story short: he couldn't. The man forgot to check how much fuel was in his gyrocopter and they had crash landed in the middle of the Australian outback, forcing them to hitch hike their way back out of the desert together.) 

He had known that this day would not be a good one from the minute he woke up and was faced with his daughter's dead eyes staring into his. “Why didn't you help us?” she whispered. Max had ignored her in favour of shrugging on a t-shirt and grabbing himself a handful of cereal, knowing full well that this would be a difficult day for him. He just hadn't comprehended how difficult at the time. 

Later, as he was changing the oil in his car by the side of the road, two men had pulled up beside him and rolled down their window. “Hey!” The first had called. “Our car keeps making weird noises, can you help us out?” Max had grunted in what he hoped was a discouraging way at the man, not looking up from his work. He heard a car door slam and when he finally raised his head the man was a lot closer to him, offering his hands up in what he probably thought was a non-threatening gesture, but in actuality looked more like a very lazy jazz hands manoeuvre. It also turned out that the man was more of a boy, the scrawniness of a growth spurt still hanging about his limbs, despite the obvious strength about his arms. He was also completely bald.  
“C'mon man,” He said, “Help us out, we're running late and we really don't want to be stranded in the middle of nowhere.” 

With a sigh, Max wiped his oily hands on his jeans and strode over to where the other car was parked. “Okay.” He said, his voice cracking from disuse. “Okay, what is the problem?”

The boys grinned at him, the first leading him over to the front of the car, while the other popped open the hood. “There's something weird going on in there, whenever we try to get above forty miles an hour it goes all clacky.” 

“Clacky?”

“You know. Like... _clackclackclackclackclack_?” 

Max sighed. “Right. Okay. I will see what I can do.” He got to work examining the engine with the little knowledge he had of its problems, but strangely enough he couldn't find anything wrong with it. A fact that seemed a lot less strange as he felt the weight of something heavy and metal thunk against the back of his skull. Suddenly, he found himself staring, not as the inner workings of a car, but at the blue sky instead. As his vision faded to black, he could just make out two hazy figures fussing over him, blurry beings that quickly joined into one, and he found himself staring up into the cold, judgemental eyes of his daughter for the second time that morning. 

“Quick, stick him with the blood checker thing!” 

“No, stupid! We tie him up first.” 

 

“ _You said you'd keep us safe..._ ” She whispered. 

 

Which brings him back to now. The first thing he felt upon waking was pain. A throbbing pain in the back of his head that seemed to spread down his neck and into his hands, which were cuffed uncomfortably behind his back, then further down to where his feet were tied and twisted underneath him to accommodate for the cramped conditions of the boot of a car. He opened his mouth to yell, but found his tongue met with the coarse cotton of a gag made from what seemed to be an oil rag. It was far too hot. His whole body ached. A loudspeaker about a foot away from his head blared heavy rock music at a volume far too loud for his throbbing head to handle. 

In the front seat of the car he heard one of his kidnappers gleefully tell the the other how pleased some guy named Joe would be by the discovery of an _O-negative_ organ donor. Yeah, Max changed his mind. This was definitely his second worst day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What even is a hash brown. I have no idea.  
> Thanks for reading! If you are enjoying this feel free to come talk to me at witchetry.tumblr.com  
> Feedback is always appreciated x


	3. Betrayal! An Imperator Gone Rogue!

 

As Max swum in and out of consciousness he caught snippets of conversation from his kidnappers.

“-Yer an idiot, Nux.”

“Maybe, but you still gotta admit it's a fucking miracle. Hurts like a bitch though.”

“Oh man, you holding up okay?

“I'm fine Slit.”

“...Look, there's food up ahead, how abouts we stop there?”

“Aw, I didn't know you cared.”

“I don't, I'm hungry.”

A pause.

“Do you think it'll be alright? I mean, the boss'll want his delivery as soon as possible, right?”

“What the Immortan doesn't know won't kill him?”

“Don't speak like that. He gave us life.”

“And he won't want us throwing it away for nothing because we was too stupid to get you food when we needed it. C'mon, the blood bag'll last another hour in the boot just fine.”

Max was vaguely aware of the sound of the engine cutting out and a car door slamming, but only just. His eyes were fixated on a dirty brown stain just in front of his nose, smeared on the scratchy lining of the trunk. It was a blood stain, he knew, but he tried to keep his mind occupied with other things it could be, pulling his thoughts back from the edge of the abyss that they constantly seemed to walk. Perhaps it was sauce from a Chinese takeout, from an evening where the two boys had sat with their food in hand in the boot of their car and watched the empty roads and talked. Or maybe it was shoe polish. Back in Australia, he had kept spare boots in his car and a drawstring bag of shoe polish. Perhaps someone had had the same thought in this car. He still keeps boots in his car, only now it is not a case of being prepared, but a necessity of his life.

He stared at the stain. The stain stared back. Perhaps it was ice cream. He thought idly, then froze. Chocolate ice cream. Ice cream bought by a little girl and her mother on an Australian Summer day. Ice cream that fell to the sand from frightened fingers and melted into a scarlet pool, brown into red, a river of blood spilt in an act of revenge because one meddling cop just couldn't leave something alone and protect his  _god damn family_ and-  _No_ . Max took a deep breath. He couldn't let his mind go down that path. He needed to think. He needed to find a way out of this. 

In the dark heat of the trunk a tiny hand stretched out and cupped Max's cheek. “ _Why didn't you help us?”_ Whispered the voice of his daughter.

 

\---

Out in the sun lit parking lot, Nux blinked at the sun. He blinked at the sun and he grinned at his best friend and literal partner in crime, who's own face was screwed up, jagged scars and all, against the light. Nux blinks and grins and feels completely alive. It's a lovely day.

The parking lot was concrete and grey and the scrub land ugly and parched, but he could feel the warmth of the sun on his bald head and he has a man in the trunk of his car that proves he is Good At His Job and as far as Nux is concerned it is a beautiful day to be alive.

Which is, of course, why Slit cuffs him over the back of the head. “You're thinking something sappy again, I can tell.” He tells Nux good naturedly. “Stop it.” Then he winks, and strides on ahead towards the garishly painted diner.

Nux takes a moment longer to take in his surroundings. There are four other vehicles in the parking lot- Two dull family cars, a van, and one very familiar truck.

“Oi, Slit!” Nux called. “ Aint this Furiosa's truck?”

Slit stopped in his tracks and eyed up the vehicle. The “War Rig” was well known to all the boys in their profession. Disguised as an oil truck, it held walls of freezers in its container, transporting the organs and blood from those scavenged by the boys to doctors and medical practices all over the country. Just last week Slit and Nux had loaded up the vehicle before it headed out to Texas. Slit's eyes narrowed. The number plates were different, but there was no mistaking the skeletal markings its driver had sprayed on its side. “It's the War Rig.”

Nux hummed. “What's it doing out here? I thought Furiosa was supposed to be loading it up today. She's meant to be going to Austin tomorrow, isn't she?”

Slit shrugged. “Whatever. There was probably a change of plan or something, 's not our place to say.”

Nux nodded and followed Slit into the diner where suddenly, and without warning, everything went to shit.

The bell above the diner door dinged gently into a stifling silence as Slit stood frozen in front of the dying smiles of Furiosa Imperator and the five wives of their employer.

“Oh shi-” was all he managed to say before Splendid punched him in the face. He stumbled backwards into Nux, who went tumbling back down through the door he had just entered through. The women sprinted past and Slit tried to grab at their legs but to no avail. Cursing, he rose to his feet.

“What the fuck? Who are they? What's going on?” Fumbled a confused Nux as he jogged after his friend.

“You idiot! Those are Joe's wives! Furiosa's nicked them!”

Nux considered this. “I didn't know Furiosa swung that way.” he mused to himself they ran towards the car.

Slit hit him. “No! I mean she's kidnapped them!” Then, a beat later. “You thought she was straight? Really?”

Nux revved the engine. “No! I mean, well it's none of my business really, I just never considered she was poly. I always figured she was ace.”

“What the _fuck_ are you talking about?” 

Nux shrugged and slumped down in his seat. “That lady we scavenged last week was talking about them before we nabbed her- remember? they're sexualiti-”

“Will you fucking _drive_ already?! They're getting away!”

Nux cackled and jammed his foot down on the accelerator. “Wife rescue, here we go!”

\---

On the War Rig Furiosa gripped the leather of her steering wheel and gritted her teeth. “Toast!” She snapped. “Do you still have that gun I gave you?”

“Yes ma'am!”

“Lean out the window and try and get a clean shot of them.” Toast nodded and clambered over The Dag, kneeling on her lap. The Dag wrapped one arm around Toast's waist but the other clasped her wrist tightly.

“Don't kill them.” She said solemnly. “We are not killers.”

Toast scoffed, but nodded, and took care to aim away from the heads of the boys. The speed of the truck ruffled her hair out from under her hairband and into her eyes, and although she had once read an entire book on marksmanship, her hands now shook with the effort of aiming. Carefully, she squeezed the trigger- and missed. The bullet sailed over the hood of the car and Toast swore in frustration.

“Careful.” The Dag warned. Behind her Cheedo whimpered and Capable offered a small smile of encouragement.

In the front seat of the cabin Splendid breathed heavily, still recovering from the sprint to the truck. Her hand rubbed absent mindedly at the unborn child in her stomach, making sure it was alright, before she realised what she was doing and stopped herself. She flinched when Toast fired her gun again. And then again.

“I can't do it!” Toast exclaimed in frustration. “I can't get a clear shot!”

“Keep. Trying.” Furiosa growled out, her foot pressing itself flat on the accelerator.

Suddenly, the engine let out a loud, spluttering sound and all six women paled.

“Shit!” Furiosa gasped.

Splendid glanced a Furiosa in horror “What's wrong, what's happening?”

“Something's up with the engine. I can probably fix it but it's possible it'll give out soon unless we get away from these guys.”

“Shit.”

“What are we going to do?”

Furiosa glared down at the wheel under her flesh hand gripped the steering wheel. She sighed, then looked up with new resolve. “We fight.”

“What?”

“We turn around while we still have the advantage and we fight them.”

Capable's eyes lit up. “This truck's a lot bigger than theirs. We could slam the breaks and they'd go crashing into us?”

Furiosa shook her head. “It's too dangerous. The impact would still hurt and its not a risk I'm willing to take with Splendid pregnant. It could rupture something.”

“Do it!” Snapped Splendid. “I don't care!”

“No. We have to hit them. It's safer. Toast, I need you to take out their tire, it'll slow them down enough for us to turn around and ram into them.”

Toast fired her gun again and whined in frustration. “I can't! I can't do it, I've never done this before.”

Furiosa sighed and turned to Splendid. “I need you to drive the truck.”

“What?” Splendid shrieked as Furiosa grabbed her soft hands under her own calloused one and placed them on the steering wheel.

She reached back with her metal arm. “Give me the gun.” And Toast handed it over without a word, settling back into her seat. Furiosa leaned out the window. Furiosa took aim. The front tire of the car burst open. As soon as she saw the car veer off course, the pale figure of the bald boy battling desperately with the wheel, Furiosa regained control of her vehicle from Splendid. Her prosthetic arm clamped down on the gear stick, while her right hand gripped the wheel and spun it as fast as it could as her feet danced with the pedals. The truck skidded down the tarmac road, its tires _screaming_ in discontent, and suddenly she was facing down the boys. 

The engine revved and picked up speed. Furiosa smiled. “Brace yourselves.” She said, three seconds before the War Rig collided with the smaller car with a sickening  _crunch_ and a wave of sparks. The War Rig carried the car with it as it accelerated, scuffing its tires on the ground and cracking the wind screen, the still conscious driver yelling as he was propelled backwards, while his passenger appeared to have been knocked out. Finally, the engine caught fire with a hiss and the boot popped open. Finally satisfied, Furiosa hit the brake but didn't cut the engine, stepping out of her door with a gun at the ready. 

She approached the car cautiously, giving it as wide a birth as she dared. The driver was groaning and clutching his head, while his friend lay unconscious with his head on the dashboard. Suddenly, a growl like an animal that tapered into a whine graced her ears and, as she rounded the car, a third person came into view.

He was battered and bruised, grease covering his clothes and face, bleeding heavily from a head wound with a gag over his face, and his hands and feet were restrained behind him. As she watched, he shuffled desperately to the edge of the trunk, heaving himself out and landing on the dusty road with a thump. He was a mess.

Furiosa stepped forward but at the sound of her boot hitting the road his head turned to her and his eyes were sharp and wide with madness. She felt her heart clench in sympathy.

Having deemed the man harmless, Furiosa moved back towards the front seats of the car. The passenger was still unconscious but the driver boy was now gripping the car door shakily, attempting to pull himself out of the wreckage.

“Furiosa.” He growled. “Give- give them back.”

Furiosa could hear the sound of the wives clambering down from the truck behind her and she felt a wave of protectiveness flood her. She trained her gun on him. “They're not going back.”

The boy clutched his side and glared at her defiantly. “You disrespect the Immortan.”

Furiosa snorted, “Your Immortan's an abusive piece of shit.”

For a moment a look of hurt flashed across the boy's face as he struggled to regain his footing. “Do not speak of him like that. He gives us life, we live still because of him! He gave you a second chance and you throw it back in his face!”

Furiosa could almost admire his loyalty. Almost. Her finger caressed the trigger, ready to shoot, but a yell interrupted her. Suddenly her sides were flanked by Capable and The Dag, who placed their hands on top of hers.

“Don't kill him.” Pleaded Capable.

“He's just delusional, he's a boy. He doesn't know any better.” The Dag added.

(She ignored his offended shout of: “He's also right here!”)

Furiosa sighed heavily and rounded on the girls “Well what do you propose we do with him? Because we can't just leave him here. If we let him go he could run and tell Joe which way we've gone and everything falls apart.”

Capable considered this. “We could... take him with us?”

If Furiosa hadn't been so stressed she may have laughed but as it was she merely threw her best withering look at the girl, who pouted in response. The Dag, meanwhile, was mulling this over.

“It could work?” She offered, gaining herself her own glare from Furiosa, “I mean, the War Boys aren't evil or nothin', they've just had their heads filled with so much of Joe's crap that they don't know their arse from their elbow any more.”

Furiosa was just opening her mouth to retort when the sound of her truck's engine graced her ears. She whipped round and, to her horror, caught sight of the man from the trunk sitting at her steering wheel. She didn't know how he managed to get his feet free, nor how he found the composure to sneak past them all and onto her vehicle, but she did know that she was _pissed._ She stepped forward a few paces towards where the man was attempting to put her vehicle into reverse. 

“Hold this.” She said, passing her gun to Toast. “Don't let the boy get away.” And with that, she broke into a sprint after her truck. As the man caught sight of her his movements became frienzied and the truck began to pick up speed as it careened backwards down the road.

Furiosa's glare caught his eye and his expression turned hunted and frighted. She chased him with a ferocity that gave him reason to look so scared.

Preoccupied by the silent, aggressive ire of the woman in persuit, the man didn't notice the sole remaining inhabitant of the truck until it was too late.

When the other women had all left, curious about the boys who had chased them, Cheedo had remained, lying still in the back seat of the cabin and thinking, uninterested in the events on the road. Now she snuck up behind the man, poised to strike like a snake. In her hand she grasped one of the thick, canvas bags that had been used to hold some of the meager possession they had grabbed as they fled that morning. At the exact moment that he caught sight of her in the rear view mirror she moved. In one fluid motion she shoved the bag over his head and grasped it tight enough that he couldn't escape and pulled on the emergency brake with her free hand. It wasn't much, and he was quickly free of the bag, but it was enough for Furiosa to catch up.

She leapt up to the door and tugged it open, dragging the man out by the gag he had yet to pull off his face. She shoved him to the ground.

He grunted and struggled to stand up, but she pushed him down. He grabbed her by her metal arm and attempted a headbutt that fell short. Still handcuffed and weakened from fatigue and blood loss, his struggles were energetic but sloppy and the ensuing fist fight was quickly won by Furiosa.

She pinned his shoulders to the ground and seated herself on his back. “Listen.” She spat, “I am not the enemy. And I get that you think this is the only option you have right now, I do, but there are five women with me who need to escape this just as much as you do and  _I will not let you take this from them_ .”

He groaned in pain and she pressed him further into the tarmac. “Do you understand?”

He grunted in a way that might have been affirmative and Furiosa decided to take what she could get.

“I'm going to get off you now.” She told him. “And if you try and do something like that again I will not hesitate to shoot you, do you understand?”

He nodded.

“Good.”

The return to where Toast, Splendid, Capable and The Dag still held the war boy hostage was easier than expected, with the man choosing not to struggle as Furiosa frogmarched him to the wreckage. She could, however, feel him tense with fear and distrust under her hand as his once prison drew closer. She felt an ounce of pity stir in her gut for this man. She had never had to deal with this part of Joe's business. The collection of “donors” had always been a job reserved for employees made loyal through the delusion that their boss had somehow saved them. Sometimes it was by giving them a better life than the one they had had before, but usually the loyalty came by finding those made vulnerable by an illness they couldn't afford to cure. Joe would find them and speak with them, detailing the help he could offer and painting himself as a God in their eyes.

Furiosa had never viewed him as anything other than human. Vile, cruel and evil-yes. But human. And susceptible to all the weaknesses that humans are.

She shoved the man down to the ground and took the gun back from Toast, pulling another one from a holster under her shirt and training on gun on each man. “Okay so now what?” she said, addressing the wives. “The easiest thing to do would be to kill at least this one,” She flicked the gun pointed at the driver boy. “But you don't want to do that, so now it's up to you.”

Splendid stepped forward to stand beside her. “We take them with us.” She said fimly. Then, quieter so only Furiosa could hear. “If they turn out to be too much trouble we'll drop them off at a city and pretend that's where we were going all along. If the boy makes it back to Joe then he'll have him looking in the wrong place. I don't think they will be much trouble though. Capable tends to be right about these things. She was right about you.”

Furiosa nodded in assent and stepped towards the two men. She knelt down next to the man on the ground and used a key on her belt to unlock one of the cuffs. “I'm sorry about this.” She murmured, “But you did just try to steal my truck.” And with that she pulled him over to where the other man stood and attached the cuff to his wrist, trapping them together. “You're both going to be coming with us.” She told them and turned to the wives. “Capable, this was your idea so you're responsible for them. Take them to the truck. Toast- have a gun. I have an engine to fix.” She tossed her second gun to Toast, who caught it with ease, and stalked back towards her truck.

The wives glanced at each other and smiled their small smiles, while Capable surveyed the two men and grinned. Their trip just got a lot more interesting.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for such a late update! I had my final art deadline and had to pull like a week of all nighters to get it done, but that's all over now so I can work on this a lot more~  
> Let me know what you thought, and as always, feel free to hit me up on [my tumblr](http://witchetry.tumblr.com).

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!  
> I intend to update this as often as I can and plan to have it finished by mid-August at the very latest.  
> Sorry for any errors I've made, this is the first time I've written fanfiction since I was thirteen, and the first time I've done any proper creative writing in about two years, so sorry about my tenses.  
> Let me know what you think, and feel free to hit me up on [my tumblr](http://witchetry.tumblr.com/)!


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